


Five Places Like This

by DoreyG



Category: Some Like It Hot (1959)
Genre: Bands, Five Times, Friendship, Gen, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-01
Updated: 2016-12-01
Packaged: 2018-09-03 15:37:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8719315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoreyG/pseuds/DoreyG
Summary: The first gig they play together, properly play as opposed to just bumming around on street corners and hoping for tips from the rare kindly passer-by, is... Weird, to say the least.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [brandytook](https://archiveofourown.org/users/brandytook/gifts).



**I.**

The first gig they play together, properly play as opposed to just bumming around on street corners and hoping for tips from the rare kindly passer-by, is... Weird, to say the least.

"Joe," he hisses out of the corner of his mouth, managing to keep playing his bass only through supreme effort.

"Shut up," Joe mutters back out of the side of his mouth, obediently - or, at least, as obediently as Joe ever _gets_ \- waiting for the next sax part.

" _Joe_."

"Shut _up_."

"That's exactly what I shouldn't do!" He snaps, or snaps as much as he can considering that he's carefully keeping his voice at a whisper, "I shut up when you said you had a plan to finally start bringing us some money in, I shut up when you told me about this gig in the first place, I shut up even when we actually _got_ here. And now, Joe, now I am _done_ shutting up!"

"That's nice," Joe drawls, does him the supreme _honour_ of turning his head half an inch in his direction, "I notice you're still playing, though."

"I said I was done shutting up, I didn't say that I was _stupid_ ," he draws in a deep breath, decides to be a _tiny_ bit less stupid still and fixes a bright and happy smile upon his face, "Joe, _surely_ you notice how strange this all is? How loony? How completely off the rocker!"

"Stop doing that, you look like you're about to snap and murder us all!" Joe hisses, dares to elbow him in the side so hard that he almost loses his place in the music for a moment, "and, okay, so it isn't the most conventional of gigs..."

"Joe."

"The most cushy of shows."

" _Joe_."

"The most glorious of debuts upon the world stage..."

" _Joe_!" He snaps, voice rising above a whisper for the first time since they got into this crazy joint, "We are standing on top of what may well be an actual iceberg, in the only suits we actually own, playing to an audience that seems to largely consist of _penguins_!"

There's a very long, very silent pause. Even the rest of the band seem to trail off, to stare at him and his sudden outburst. There's a slow rustle of feathers from their far from captive audience, a few faintly disturbing honks that he _never_ expected a penguin to be able to make.

"And you are _very_ excited about that," Joe growls, and elbows him in the side again as the noise slowly picks back up, "honestly, you idiot, do you want to get us both killed?"

"Penguins and murder," he says somewhat sourly, getting back into the rhythm of the song, "you're sure selling this place, Joe."

"Look," Joe lifts his hands pleadingly up to his face, realizes that he's still holding his Sax at the last minute and narrowly avoids braining himself in a way that'd be both violent and amusing, "no matter your problems with this place, no matter your problems with _my_ choice of gig after a _long_ dry spell for both of us, surely you can appreciate that being here is better than being out on the streets still? Come on, Jerry, you're killing me. Can't you at least give your old pal that?"

"Joe," he says, as icily as he can. Which is, for once, pretty icy considering that they're still standing on an actual iceberg, "at this point the street is at least warmer, _and_ has far fewer birds for us to worry about."

There's a long pause, Joe's fingers twitching on his sax and the band playing desperately on.

"Yeah, you're probably right," Joe says, on a low sigh that immediately springs back to his usual insanely optimistic grin, "we'll see out this night, and then split. Nothing to worry about, really. The Greyhound track is open again tomorrow, and if we put both our earnings from tonight on this _beautiful_ dead cert we won't have to worry about playing a gig ever again!"

 

\--

 

**II.**

Two weeks later, they're playing a gig again.  
"Jerry!" Joe leans over to him and hisses, halfway through the set, "Jerry, do _not_ ignore me."

"Shut up, I'm ignoring you," he says promptly... And then sighs. Decides, as he so often does, that there's no point in maintaining the ruse now and turns himself as far as he can towards Joe while still keeping his hands on the double-bass, "what _is_ it, Joe?"

Joe scowls at him a little, an expression that does not at all convince him that dropping the pretense was a sensible idea, "I'm hot."

"You're..." He blinks for a second, finds himself frowning disbelievingly the next. Of all the absurd complaints that Joe has come out with over the course of their friendship, of all the truly ridiculous _codswallop_ he's tried to sell as reasonable, this truly takes the biscuit, "and _why_ exactly is that a problem, pray?"

Joe shifts awkwardly for a second, still scowling. He waits him out as best he can, resisting the urge to jiggle his leg or tap his fingers on the strings or start screaming for the guy to put him out of his suspenseful misery already, "I'm _too_ hot."

"Joe," he says, trying to sound reasonable and failing so utterly that one of the waitresses - an extremely pretty girl, allowed to show rather a lot of skin due to the theme - actually drops her pasted on polite smile to give him a rather worried frown as she passes by, "we live in Chicago."

"So?"

"So I am at a loss as to why you consider that a problem!" He snaps, lowers his voice only when several more waitresses - all pretty, all wearing floral wreathes, all unlikely to speak to either of them ever again - glance suspiciously in their direction, "look, can't you see that this job is perfect? We get free drinks, we get to stand in the warm all day, we get to look at the pretty waitresses-" and waiters "-as they pass by. What's your problem with the garden of Eden, Joe?"

"It's too hot," Joe only repeats stubbornly, lets out a faintly inappropriate toot on his Sax that has several other members of the band scowling and shifting in their seats, "honestly, Jerry, it feels like my legs are about to melt off."

"Well, _maybe_ if you didn't insist upon wearing your trousers under the grass skirt this wouldn't be an issue!" He snarls, and continues playing his part of the song absolutely perfectly - sending an ingratiating smile in the direction of the other members of the band, hoping that _they'll_ remember his perfection over Joe's sheer bloody-mindedness.

A long period of relative silence follows, as they play their instruments and stubbornly refuse to look at each other.

"... _Jerry_."

"Oh no," he hisses disbelievingly, throwing his attempt at calm indifference to the wind in favour of spinning despairingly in Joe's direction, "Oh _no_ , you do _not_ get to use that tone with me!"

"What tone?" Joe asks, using _that_ tone. The tone that has seduced a hundred innocent maidens to bed, the tone that has convinced a thousand poor fools to give him another chance, the tone that has gotten him into a million scrapes or more, "Look, I only wanted to say that I do understand your position."

He narrows his eyes, thrown off course by this tactic as he always - always! - is, "you do?"

"Of course I do," Joe says, the very image of sympathy, "this is definitely a nice place, and a _good_ gig. The waitresses are pretty, the band is _reasonably_ competent, the drinks are _sometimes_ on the house..."

"My ears don't feel like they're about to fall off," he sniffs, pointedly, "and, hey, what do you mean sometimes? My drinks have _always_ been on the house."

"Yeah, but you aren't trying to get more for five ladies at once on a nightly basis," Joe mutters, and moves quickly on before he can do more than give a scandalized blink at that, "all I'm _saying_..."

"Oh no."

"Out of the goodness of my heart..."

" _Oh_ no-"

"Is that you deserve better."

And, as always, Joe manages to find the one thing to say that'll stop him in his tracks. He freezes, blinks, stares thoughtfully into space as Joe somehow manages to make a perfectly innocent smile look natural on his smug face.

"...Better?" He asks, somewhat taken aback to find his voice already wavering, "what do you mean?"

"I mean that we - that _you_ \- are far too talented for this place, Jerry," Joe says, with an incredibly sincere expression bright upon his face. He could've almost been a choirboy, looking like that, "we deserve more than this two bit joint, a stingy bartender and an atmosphere I - we - could suffocate in. We deserve to live like _kings_."

"By that logic," he replies, still unable to stop himself from thinking, "we also deserve better than playing on street corners, freezing our ears off and hocking our winter coats every few weeks."

"Why does it have to be such a polarized choice, Jerry my boy?" Joe asks him, puts on his most imploring expression like he _knows_ that he can never resist it, "it's not a case of one or the other, cold streets or boiling club rooms. We're too good for that, we're too _smart_ for that. We could easily see another way!"

He frowns for a second, still ever so thoughtfully plucking at his strings.

"...Unless you're too dim to see your own potential, of course."

"I'm not dim!" He snaps, riled in the way that only Joe can manage, "And, fine, you've made your point, maybe we _are_ destined for better things than sipping mai-tais and flirting with Paolo- Paulina in the set breaks."

"Thattaboy," Joe grins, kindly ignoring his slip.

"Let's just play to the end of this set, and then we can get out of here," he sighs, already resigned to the loss of the warmth around them, "I trust that you have a better plan, for when we get out of here?"

"As long as we leave before the waitresses get off, that's _fine_ ," Joe murmurs, his smile turning slightly absent in the way it always does when he's got what he wants, "and, er, yeah. I definitely have _something_..."

 

\--

 

**III.**

"Joe," he starts, somewhat petulantly.

"Jerry," Joe starts at the exact same moment, _definitely_ petulantly in only the way that Joe can manage.

There's a long moment of faintly baffled silence. And then, together: "My ears hurt."

"This was your plan?" He hisses, when he's recovered from the fairly profound shock of actually agreeing with Joe on something for once, " _This_ was what you made me quit the last gig for? We could be sipping mai-tais now, flirting with any number of cute waitresses-"

"Or band leaders," Joe murmurs, somewhat sullenly.

"-And instead we're here. _Here_! Wearing _earrings_ and playing in a tiny room where absolutely _nobody_ is listening to us!"  
"Be quiet, you idiot," Joe hisses as what looks like a mob boss, what almost certainly _is_ a mob boss considering their current location, spares a glance in their direction, "I know this plan may not have been one of my best, but there's no need to deliberately get us both killed over it!"

He stares for a long few seconds, unsure whether to be openly stunned or obviously smug.

" _What_?"

"I think," he says, settling for a mixture of both. Smug shock, in that very particular way he likes to think that only he can pull off, "that that's the first time you've ever admitted that one of your plans was bad."

"I _said_ that it wasn't one of my best, not that it was bad!" Joe retorts, with a certain twist of his mouth that doesn't exactly get rid of the smugness "...Look, though, I already have a better plan waiting in the wings."

"Oh no."

"A far better plan."

"Oh _no_."

"Possibly the best plan I've ever, and I mean _ever_ , come up with in my life!"

"The last time you said something like that, we ended up here," he says, in what he feels is a justifiably sour tone, "the time before that, we ended up playing to a bunch of penguins. The time before _that_..."

"Jerry," Joe sighs, sounding honestly wounded, "do you really want to hurt me like this?"

" _Joe_."

"Do you really want to stamp on my feelings in such a way? Shatter my heart so viciously? Rip apart my dreams without even a care?" Joe pouts at him, does those puppy dog eyes that always - _always_ \- manage to get his fling of the week to melt into his arms "...Do you really want to piss off your one chance to get out of here, before he's even given you a taste of his plan?"

He considers this for a long few seconds, pretending that he's completely and utterly unaffected by that hangdog - _unfairly_ appealing - expression.

"Jerry?"

"This better," he grumbles, hoping he sounds cool and confident and not like a terrified goon plucking desperately at his bass to avoid getting shot by multiple mobsters, "be the best plan of your life, and have absolutely _no_ chance of failing."

"Trust me, Jerry boy," and Joe only grins his widest and most terrifying grin, "it involves _horses_."

 

\--

 

**IV.**

"I have to admit!" He says cheerfully, a few months later with properly _distinguished_ music playing in the background, "when you said that your latest plan involved horses, I was a little worried as to what the hell you were up to!"

Joe only grunts, looking faintly miserable with his life.  
"I thought that it'd be another one of your insane plans," he continues anyway, forcefully optimistic and _confident_ in it now that they're standing in this rich room playing their instruments for a crowd of discerning heiresses in gowns, "another crazy scheme that you'd drag me into against my better judgement, and that'd end up backfiring in our faces horribly..."

Joe only grunts again, fingering his Sax in a faintly mournful manner.

"But it isn't!" He forges onwards, cheery optimism now - despite his best efforts - tinged with a touch of desperation, "it's actually, and you can quote me on this, absolutely _wonderful_. I mean, just look at it! The heiresses, the warm room, the free wine, the numerous people who will actually talk to you like a human being..."

Joe only grunts _again_ , glances around the room with a terrifyingly thoughtful expression on his face.

"It's perfect!" He finishes, well aware that his tone is almost entirely desperate by now and yet Joe is still standing besides him _silently_ , "absolutely perfect and wonderful and I've never seen anything as good and _will you please stop staring_."

"Can't a man stare into space?" Joe finally speaks, his tone so mournful that he'd throw his hands up in the air if he wasn't currently playing bass to earn his supper, "can't a man stare into space and think upon his friend's words, Jerry? Will you take _that_ from me too?"

He will not crack, he vows to himself as his fingers keep moving on the bass, he will _not_ crack. He will resist Joe for the first time in his life, he will keep playing, he will eat his well earned supper at the end of this night in perfect peace... "Too?"

"Jerry," Joe says, expression only briefly flickering smug at his _inevitable_ caving in, "are you seriously going to tell me that you haven't noticed what I'm going through, what I'm facing?"

"I am seriously going to tell you that, yes," he snaps, trying very hard to firm his heart against the wavering - _manipulative_ \- note in Joe's voice, "because, in case you haven't noticed, you're going through nothing and facing _nothing_."

"Jerry..."

"What is there to go through?" He hisses, already on edge despite the utter charm of the atmosphere, "A warm room? Kind heiresses? People not looking down their noses at us on a pretty much constant basis?"

" _Jerry_..."

"What is there to _face_?" He carries on, voice growing steadily more shrill as the perfumed atmosphere of the room - formerly so fragrant and welcoming - starts to feel more like a prison locking him and Joe together, "nice meals? Good wine? _Not_ starving on the streets of Chicago?"

"Jerry!" Joe huffs, and his expression is downright _wounded_. Like he's the one being wronged here! "we must not be as good friends as I thought, if you haven't noticed that I'm _suffocating_ in here. I feel like a canary, sitting in a gilded cage with his wings plucked. I feel like a rabbit, trapped on a little girl's lap and dressed in ribbons. I feel like a fat house cat, who can only lounge on a windowsill and long for the world outdoors!"

"All of those," He hisses, knowing very well that he sounds absolutely irrational and not really caring all that much, "sound fairly nice things to be!"

"I feel _trapped_ , Jerry," Joe only finishes sincerely, ignoring him completely in that very specific way that only Joe can manage, "trapped. And if you can't recognize that, if you can't sympathize with my plight... Well, you are downright _colluding_ with my imprisonment."

He remains silent for a long few moments, staring sullenly into space. Now that Joe has worked his magic, he has to admit that the room _does_ feel a little more claustrophobic than it did even a few minutes ago. The perfume is pungent, the atmosphere is choking and the smiles of the heiresses are insincere under their jeweled beauty.

"Jerry?"

"Look," he tries one last time, pleadingly, "this is a _good_ gig, Joe. We're warm, we're safe, we're only rarely taking our lives into our own hands. We get to hobnob with _nice_ people, ladies with lovely names like Myrtle or Florence or _Daphne_. Do you really want to throw all that away, just because you're getting a little stir crazy?"

"You think Daphne is a nice name?" Joe asks, briefly dropping his wounded deer act in favour of open confusion.

" _Joe_!"

"I've made up my mind, Jerry," Joe says, reverting to wide eyed innocence so quickly - so _comprehensively_ \- that he'd almost believe it if he hadn't known the guy for so long, "no more will I be a canary in a cage, a rabbit on a lap, a cat on a windowsill. I must be allowed to flourish and create, to rise above the boundaries of society, to explore a whole new world as best I can. I must be _free_ , Jerry!"

He sighs, bows his head over his double bass and resigns himself to misery yet again.

"...And, hey, I think we can probably sneak a few bottles of wine out with us as we go?"

 _Drunken_ misery, though, and that makes up for a hell of a lot.

 

\--

**V.**

"Jerry," Joe says, tone wheedling, "will you _please_ look at me?"

He sniffs, _loudly_. Turns his head as far away as he can, considering that he's currently frozen to the bone.

"Jerry," Joe repeats, actually sounding borderline _guilty_ for the first time in his life. A miracle, an actual verifiable miracle! "Please? You can't ignore me forever, we're in the same band."

He sniffs, even louder. Half expects an icicle to spring up out of his nose, at this rate.

"Jerry..."

He sniffs, so loud that a passing horse - an actual, real life, bloody _horse_ \- startles as it passes by...

" _Jerry_..."

"No," he coughs, his long suspected cough confirmed, and _spins_ back in Joe's direction - hopeful that his eyes are flashing with fury, his face is drawn tight, his entire expression speaks of a deep agitation that will not be denied, "No! You do _not_ get to use that tone with me anymore, Joe, and shame on you for trying!"

"What tone?" Joe asks, attempting to look innocent and somehow - somehow, for the very _first_ time in his life - just continuing to look guilty instead.

"The tone you always use when you've screwed up our entire lives, again!" He huffs dramatically, jerking his fingers sharply on his bass before they actually freeze to the strings, "the tone that you always use when you've crushed my hopes and don't feel quite like acknowledging it! The tone you _always_ use when you want to get out of your latest unholy mess!"

Joe remains silent for a long few seconds, still looking guilty. Or maybe that's just cold, it's hard to tell with all those scarves in the way, "look, Jerry..."

"And I'm not falling for it anymore," he huffs, interrupting Joe for perhaps the first time in _his_ life. Swings away as best he can, considering that his feet are currently two large blocks of ice in their shoes, and continues playing to their race course audience with a certain kind of vicious apathy, "I'm not forgiving you this time, I'm not falling into your latest scheme and I am _not_ letting you wriggle out of this. I am done, Joe, _done_!"

Joe remains silent for a long few moments, staring at him. There's faint alarm mixed in with the possible guilt now, the expression of a man who has just realized that he's pushed just a little too far "...Look. _Look_. Don't you know that this has always been _my_ dream, to work at a race course? Don't you realize that I've always longed to be so very close to the action? Don't you _see_ -?"

"Nope," he says, almost cheerfully, and continues playing his part of the song through gritted teeth, "and nor do I hear, smell, touch or taste."

"Jer..."

"I _mean_ it, Joe," he spins to send one final, withering look in Joe's direction, "this is my final bow, my last scheme. I'll finish playing this song, sure, but then I am _out_... And if you aren't careful, you may just have to find a new roommate alongside your new patsy."

There's a long, stricken silence from besides him for a few moments.

...And then Joe sighs, and grabs his arm. The music cuts off suddenly. The rest of the band starts grumbling in the background, the race course goers look a touch confused and the horses gambol in open relief in the background.

He turns, in shock, to find Joe staring at him apologetically. Has to think for a long few moments, before words actually appear "...Wha'?"

Well, Rome wasn't built in a day.

"I didn't realize," Joe says slowly, as if pulling teeth, "how much that last job meant to you. And I didn't realize, how little you were cut out for playing in a low rent course-side band."

"Joe," he says warningly, helplessly confused as the other members of the band start to grumble more urgently, "if this is another guilt trip..."

"It isn't, Jerry," Joe looks away for a moment, and then looks straight back into his eyes. His expression is perfectly sincere, that of a saint finally atoning for all his - many, _many_ \- sins, "it's... Oh, I didn't actually want to say it out loud, you big lug, but it's an _apology_. I've treated you like hell the past few months, and I can't be surprised that you've finally had enough of me."

"Joe," he says urgently, somewhat taken aback by such sudden sincerity, "it's not _you_ that I've had enough of. You're my best friend, I'll never have enough of you! It's just playing at all these shitty joints, and having to leave the nice ones, and having to participate in all your _schemes_..."

"It's too much," Joe nods solemnly, as if reading his mind. His expression remains perfectly calm despite the increasing tide of rage around them, as if there's nothing more important in the world than this conversation, "I know. But, Jerry, if you forgive me... If you come back to me, and agree to leave the past in the past, I _promise_ you that I will never force you into another scheme ever again."

"You swear it?" He asks, feeling oddly emotional, "On... Somebody really important, like the president?"

"I do," Joe says, placing his hands behind his back and straightening his posture like he's agreeing to the most serious bargain in all the world, "I swear, on the president _and_ the vice-president, that I will never drag you into another scheme again. Is that good enough?"

"Oh, Joe," he sighs, almost _happy_ despite the whip of the wind around them and the ever increasing murmur of the race course inhabitants like the buzz of angry bees, "it's _more_ than good enough, to tell you the truth."

"Good," Joe smiles a genuine smile at him, and then seizes his arm again, "and now that that's sorted, we should _probably_ start moving away from here rather quickly..."

 

\--

 

( **VI.**

"Jerry!" Joe blurts a few weeks later, bounding into their shared apartment with a great deal more enthusiasm than sense, "you're going to hate me, but I was talking to Sarah just outside the agency - you remember Sarah? Blonde hair, always used to keep clogging the drain with it? - And _she_ said that she'd heard of this excellent opportunity at a speakeasy disguised as a funeral parlour, and I thought- Jerry, why are you banging your head against that wall?"

He groans lowly in reply, keeps steadily grinding his head against that wonderfully sensible wall.

Somehow, he thinks the appropriate phrase is _here they go again._ )


End file.
